Resilience

Kids are resilient. My previous post described the cute little bunny that Caroline and her friend rescued from the basement window well several weeks ago.

Caroline just adored this creature; each morning she'd waken earlier than most children during summer vacation and stroke, feed, pamper, and coddle her new bunny. But as nature would dictate, one morning after I'd returned home from running errands, Caroline's countenance said it all: The bunny died.

She had told me how she found the poor creature, and how she even tried to revive it by giving it mouth-to-mouth resuscitation through a straw. Poor child. I pictured her using a straw in a vain attempt to breathe life into this creature; her efforts, unfortunately, were useless. Her tears fell hard, and even though I never really wanted that rabbit in the first place, it was very difficult for me to swallow the lump that formed in my own throat. My eyes watered slightly, not because of the rabbit's death, but because of the effect the rabbit's life had had on my daughter.

But she buried the bunny in the back yard, and Mystie, our dog continues to sniff that area and is at a loss as to what could possibly be there.

Now, weeks later, the bunny is a distant memory in Caroline's mind. Her focus has returned to where it had been before the bunny ever came into her life, namely, her time with friends, playing her guitar, and teaching her puppy silly tricks.

I'm sure that she will always remember the bunny that she rescued from the window well, and how she held it and tried to keep it alive. For more than a week, her love overflowed onto that little creature, and even though it's gone, her memories of Thumper will most likely linger for years, if not for the rest of her life.

And you know, I don't think that I'll soon forget it either. It made me realize how something so seemingly insignificant can impact a little girl forever.